Hi, I'm Evelyn GameDev and a full-time indie developer in Japan.
In this blog post, I want to share my experience of becoming a full-time IndieDev 1 year and 6 months after I started learning Unity.
I started learning Unity after watching a Youtube video about The First Tree developer's success story.
It was like a light bulb went on in my head and then popped.
This made me realize that I, too, must learn Unity and work on game development.
I want to share with you what I gained from this process.
I have a 1:20-minute video summary if you want to watch it, please.
I hope that the content of this article will have some positive impact on your activities.
Table Of Content
My Personality and Experience
I went to an economics university but dropped out to become a Manga artist.
However, I gave that up and got a job at a design office. A few years later, I worked as a front-end engineer for the web.
Before I studied C# with Unity, I could only do Javascript.
Learning Game Development
First, I started learning with video materials.
Learning new things is fun.
I wanted to learn systematically, so I purchased and took several Udemy courses from GameDev.tv.
- The video is long but very detailed.
- Support is good.
If you do not want to pay, you can use Youtube videos, etc. In that case, I recommend trying video materials such as Youtube or the official tutorial called Unity Learn.
This is because if you are not familiar with Unity's user interface and API, it is better to watch videos and imitate them to avoid frustration.
Things to watch out for
The First Tree's success stories influenced me, but conversely, I looked into their failures.
Then I realized that there were many people who had not done well and that the road seemed to be a hard one.
While gathering information on the Discord community, I heard a story about a person who spent 4 years developing a game that sold only 8 copies.
I then decided to start with smaller projects instead of working on long-term projects like that.
I made a conscious effort to learn from successes as well as failures.
Trial and error and my solution
And I have created many products that can be developed in 1~2 week.
Since I was learning Unity, I had a lot of failures with low-quality products at first.
My project failed and failed and failed some more.
But it is a different story when a project that took 4 years to complete fails than when a project that took 2 weeks to complete fails.
And I always thought about how to improve and kept researching the market.
And I finally found a way to come alive.
Instead of developing what I wanted to create, I decided to develop what users wanted.
Having already developed many products, I have been able to gather the opinions of many users.
I then developed a posing application named VRM Posing Desktop based on user feedback.
And I received a lot of response on the first day of its release.
I was very happy that so many people liked the concept.
I also received constructive feedback, and for the first time my tweet received so many reactions.
- 2000+ likes
- 700+ retweets
- 50+ replies
I then continued to update the app based on further feedback.
Finally, I was able to make a living as a full-time individual developer.
What it's like to be a full-time IndieDev
When it came time to become a full-time IndieDev, it was only the beginning and a passing phase.
My ambition to develop and live as an Indie has turned into an ambition to create my own production studio.
I feel I have more things I want to do and learn, and my horizons have broadened.
I'll continue to learn, and step by step, I'll continue to accumulate days of steady development.
Conclusion
- Learning:
Don't fall behind with video materials. - Research:
Learn not only from successes but also from failures. - Development:
Listen to your users.
The most important thing is to have confidence in yourself, keep thinking, and keep improving.
Thank you for reading to the end.
And I wish you the best of luck on your journey.
